Penn State 'screwed up' on Sandusky scandal, ex-coach alleges

By Dave Warner, Reuters

Posted:
07/30/2013 08:12:19 AM MDT

Former Penn State assistant football coach Mike McQueary exits the Dauphin County Courthouse, Monday, July 29, 2013, in Harrisburg, Pa. McQueary testified Monday as a star witness in a hearing for three former Penn State officials accused in a cover-up in the Jerry Sandusky child sex abuse scandal.
(Matt Rourke, Associated Press)

HARRISBURG, Pa. - Former Penn State officials accused of covering up Jerry Sandusky's child sexual abuse return to court on Tuesday, a day after a key witness recalled legendary coach Joe Paterno criticizing their handling of the case.

At the heart of the coverup case against former Penn State president Graham Spanier, former athletic director Tim Curley and former senior vice president Gary Schultz is an account by former football coach Mike McQueary, who testified on Monday he saw Sandusky sexually abuse a child in the locker room showers in February 2001.

The next morning, McQueary testified, he told Paterno what he saw and also told Curley and Schultz. No one told police.

Sandusky, 69, a former assistant football coach, was convicted in June 2012 of 45 counts of sexual abuse involving 10 boys. He is serving a sentence of 30 years to 60 years in a state prison.
Spanier, 65, Curley, 59, and Schultz, 63 are accused of a "conspiracy of silence" for failing to report the shower incident to authorities, which permitted Sandusky to continue preying on boys, most of whom he met through a charity he founded for at-risk youth.

McQueary testified about a series of talks he had with Paterno, including one in which Paterno told him "Old Main screwed up," using a nickname for the administrative center of Penn State.

McQueary lost his job as a receivers coach after charges were filed against Sandusky in November 2011.

Advertisement

Sandusky was arrested in November 2011 and charged with molesting boys. A year later, in November 2012, a grand jury charged Spanier, Curley and Schultz with endangering the welfare of children, criminal conspiracy and obstruction of justice. Spanier also was charged with perjury.

Curley and Schultz were previously charged in November 2011 with perjury and failure to report suspected abuse.

Spanier was fired from Penn State; Curley was placed on administrative leave and Schultz had already retired from the school.

Harrisburg District Judge William Wenner will decide if there is enough evidence to bring the case to trial after the preliminary hearing.

Within weeks of Sandusky's arrest, Penn State Trustees fired Spanier, at the time the nation's highest-paid public university president. Trustees also fired Paterno, Sandusky's boss. Months later, Paterno, a legendary figure in college football died of lung cancer at the age of 85.

Civil lawsuits filed by the victims, now grown men, against the university are close to being settled, with the school putting aside $60 million to cover the claims, according to a lawyer for one of the plaintiffs. The attorney said there were as many as 32 claims from alleged victims.

McQueary also has filed a whistleblower and defamation lawsuit against Penn State, accusing the school of not renewing his contract because he cooperated with authorities investigating Sandusky and the Penn State officials.

And, Spanier's lawyers have served legal notice that they intend to file defamation charges against Louis Freeh, a former director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Freeh was the author of a study, commissioned by the university, spelling out a narrative of the scandal that many in the state rejected, including the Paterno family.

The Freeh report prompted the National Collegiate Athletic Association, the governing body for college sports, to issue sanctions against Penn State. The NCAA imposed a $60 million fine and voided the 14 seasons of football victories Sandusky coached.

MacIntyre says the completed project will be best in Pac-12There were bulldozers, hard hats, mud, concrete trucks, blueprints, mud, cranes, lots of noise and, uh, mud, during the last recruiting cycle when Colorado football coach Mike MacIntyre brought recruits to campus. Full Story

MacIntyre says the completed project will be best in Pac-12There were bulldozers, hard hats, mud, concrete trucks, blueprints, mud, cranes, lots of noise and, uh, mud, during the last recruiting cycle when Colorado football coach Mike MacIntyre brought recruits to campus. Full Story

Most people don't play guitar like Grayson Erhard does. That's because most people can't play guitar like he does. The guitarist for Fort Collins' Aspen Hourglass often uses a difficult two-hands-on-the-fretboard technique that Eddie Van Halen first popularized but which players such as Erhard have developed beyond pop-rock vulgarity.
Full Story